


Pepper and the Avengers (Which She Knows Nothing About)

by rebelmeg



Series: Rebelmeg's Ladies of Marvel Bingo Fills 2019 [4]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers Family, Awesome Pepper Potts, Developing Friendships, Domestic Avengers, F/M, Fluff and Humor, Light Angst, Minor Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Pepper Potts Is a Good Bro
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-30
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 02:27:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,696
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21620092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rebelmeg/pseuds/rebelmeg
Summary: Pepper knows what is important to Tony, she always has.  And the Avengers have become some of the most important people in his life.  How could she do anything but make them important to herself too?
Relationships: Pepper Potts & Avengers Team, Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
Series: Rebelmeg's Ladies of Marvel Bingo Fills 2019 [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1634662
Comments: 42
Kudos: 98
Collections: Avengers Team As Family, Ladies of Marvel Bingo 2019, Tony Stark Flash Bingo





	1. A Desperately Damaged Supersoldier

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this AGES ago, I think back before AOU, actually, when the Golden Age of the Avengers was still kind of a thing. And I miss those days, so here's a throwback.
> 
> [Rem](https://archiveofourown.org/users/remreader) totally gets all the credit for that title! I burst out laughing when she suggested it!
> 
> [Poliz ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Politzania) is my wonderful beta for this fic!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for the TSB Flash, Card 001 - Steve Rogers, and for the Ladies of Marvel Bingo square E1 - "You are the dancing queen"

Pepper Potts was aware, after many years of trial and error and bizarre circumstances, that she had become the glue that held Tony Stark together. And had been for much longer than she’d been dating him. 

Ever since he’d come back from Afghanistan, she had sensed that something in him, something intrinsic, had undergone a change. This suspicion was enforced with not only Iron Man, but all the mess surrounding the Expo months later. And now, a few years into a relationship with the most amazing, brilliant, broken man she had ever or would ever know, Pepper had come to the point where she knew Tony almost better than he knew himself. And she was grateful for every crazy moment.

She knew when something was bothering him, although getting him to cop to it was like trying to stop a Chernobyl-level disaster. She knew when he was trying to hide something. She knew when the pressures that he and the world put on himself were starting to overcome the limits of what he could bear without cracking and shattering. She knew that he would only ever ask for help if it was the absolute last resort and he had no other options, because he would rather hurt himself and risk _only_ himself than allow someone else to hurt or be at risk for his sake. That last one had been quite a point of contention between them while Pepper and Tony had been figuring themselves out.

And she knew what was important to him.

The Avengers, that mismatched group of hurt and heroism, was one of the most important things in Tony Stark’s life.

So, naturally, Pepper had made them an important part of her life too.

* * *

Steve had been, surprisingly, the easiest. She had expected it to be difficult, given the levels of tension that clogged a room whenever Steve and Tony were in it together. Not to mention that Pepper was a woman in an unusual, powerful role in a world that _still_ didn’t fully accept such a thing. Steve knew all about that, however, and it was probably the role Peggy Carter had had in his life that made it so easy for him to feel comfortable around Pepper.

It had started with a friendly offer she made a few weeks before Steve moved into the Tower. He’d come over to the in-construction and newly named Avengers Tower for a team meeting (Tony’s insistence, he didn’t like the idea of private team meetings being bugged by Fury and his spy squad), and was hanging around with the rest of the team afterward in the kitchen on the communal floor. It was the first official time that Pepper was meeting some of them, and she had felt the tacky tape residue on Steve’s hand when he’d held it out for her to shake, tape from when he worked out a punching bag. 

She had offered to take him to a sporting goods store that would supply him with better quality punching bags than the ones he’d been getting through SHIELD. She’d already planned to check with Tony about footing the bill for upgrade equipment for the team, if he hadn’t already thought of it himself. Or started work on a prototype punching bag that would withstand the abuse of a desperately damaged super soldier. 

Steve had paused, and looked at her for a moment, sitting at the island counter in the kitchen that they all frequented, flicking through the notes he’d taken during the meeting.

“It wouldn’t be a bother?” 

Pepper suspected that he was asking her a different question entirely, given the expression on his face, but didn’t mention it. She slid off her chair and smiled at Steve. “Of course not. I need a break from CEO-ing for a little while, and I’ve been meaning to get a new pair of kickboxing gloves. I just need to get my purse from upstairs and we can get going now if you want. Would you like Happy to drive us, me drive, or you drive?”

Steve had seemed somewhat perplexed and overwhelmed by the casual, friendly way Pepper was acting towards him, but it didn’t take him long to relax in her presence. Pepper rather thought that he even started enjoying himself, and they had a comfortable ride to the sporting goods store as Happy drove, talking about their own separate workout routines. (Steve’s was laughably more, well, _everything_ than Pepper’s, but neither were bothered by it.) Steve even expressed an interest in learning some kickboxing himself, and Pepper suggested that they spar together.

After that, they fell into an easy friendship. Whenever Steve found himself with a question, a problem, a story to tell, Pepper always came to mind. She took him shopping a few more times, for clothes and more gym equipment, and gave him a crash course in online shopping. And they did start sparring together, Pepper teaching him a few basics of kickboxing, and even though they were so unevenly matched it was ridiculous, it was still something they both looked forward to, time spent in good company working out frustrations they may or may not also talk about.

Pepper knew Steve had issues sometimes with modern technology (as if there were any way he could have avoided that), so she took to leaving a small notebook in the communal kitchen/living room with basic instructions for all kinds of things for Steve to follow until he memorized them. The first thing she had jotted down had been the instructions for how to microwave a frozen breakfast sandwich (too many buttons and unfamiliar symbols got Steve frustrated with himself pretty easily). He had mastered the task quickly, since he usually made three or four of the sandwiches at a time, but he left the instructions in there anyway. 

The notebook also had a written crash course on how to operate all the machines on the entertainment center in the living room, and the assorted remotes or controllers ( _so many gaming systems_ ). And which dishes could go in the dishwasher and which ones couldn’t (like he was going to make that mistake again, he still thought he could smell burning plastic sometimes). Also how to clean the vacuum filter (he insisted on cleaning up his own messes), how to DVR a show on the TV (How It’s Made was his favorite), and how to operate the kitchen appliances without setting anything on fire (any machine could become a smoke machine if you used it wrong enough, according to Tony). Almost all of the stuff in the notebook Steve had learned and memorized how to do, but he kept the notebook anyway, kept all the pages of hand-written instructions. Something about it, about seeing Pepper’s neat, feminine handwriting and not text on a floating screen, was soothing.

Pepper also found out that Steve was frequently going out on motorcycle rides to get to know the city again, and always had a suggestion for something he should see. They went on a few outings together, often with Tony or one of the Avengers, Steve’s favorite being an art opening at a large gallery near the Tower. The two of them had bonded over art, and could spend hours upon hours discussing it in great detail. Steve's jaw had dropped when Pepper had shown him the list of art in Tony's personal collection, and she had arranged for a few of them to be hung in areas around the Tower that Steve could see them anytime he wanted.

Pepper’s favorite outing had been when the two of them plus Clint and Natasha had accidentally stumbled into a street dance party, and the memory of Steve learning how to do the Chicken Dance still made her laugh. They had been about to leave when a slower song started playing, and couples paired off. Clint and Natasha had immediately stepped into a graceful box step, leaving Pepper in a slight predicament. She had been about to suggest that they move on, but then Steve had taken a deep breath, closed his eyes for a moment, and asked her to dance. 

Pepper knew about Peggy Carter. The founder of SHIELD had been Tony’s godmother after all, so she knew enough to understand why Steve’s eyes got a little red and glittery as they danced a simple waltz. But she didn’t say anything about it, just smiling and coaxing Steve into an easy conversation as they danced. She made sure they stayed for one more upbeat dance though, to chase the sadness out of his eyes, and she and Clint and Natasha taught Steve the Macarena so they could all leave laughing. The sight of Captain America finally getting the hang of circling his hips with a grin on his face was indeed one of Pepper's favorite memories.

Each time she went somewhere with Steve, or did something with him, or helped him navigate an aspect of modern life, Pepper felt a fondness for the man that made her think it must be like having a brother. A brother that got way too excited whenever Pepper agreed to go to a baseball game, often bringing one or more of the other Avengers along. And she loved it. She'd never had a brother until Steve, and couldn't imagine a better person to fill that role in her life.

It was through one of the sightseeing trips of Steve and Pepper’s that they squeezed in every month or so, that Pepper was able to get to know another Avenger, Thor.


	2. A Camera-Crazy Demigod

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thor discovers cameras with Pepper's help.

Thor had come back from Asgard two years after the Chitauri invasion, due to some crazy stuff that happened with Jane Foster. Pepper had only met the scientist very briefly once, but had recognized the same mania in her eyes that lived in Tony and Bruce, that spiking desire for understanding in their fields of science. Thor had been on Earth fairly often ever since, visiting “his lady Jane” and the other friends he’d made. He’d had to travel back and forth to Asgard and the other realms frequently, and spent as much time as possible with Jane, but occasionally he had reason to stop by the Tower. 

He stayed in his suite there that Tony had designed for him, and had participated in a few movie nights when the team had to get together for something other than protecting and defending the world. All of them liked movie night. They could never agree on what to watch, and had to take turns choosing otherwise fights were likely to break out. But there was something about lounging on the enormous sectional around the huge TV, passing around snacks, and alternately watching the movie in silence and quoting or bantering back and forth.

During one of those movie nights, Thor had expressed interest in the Statue of Liberty, having noticed that it was a frequently displayed icon in their world. Everyone explained it, and the demigod wanted to see it in person. Pepper hadn’t been at that movie night, but Tony told her about it after the fact, and soon she, Steve, and Thor had a date planned to go see the Statue of Liberty. Natasha tagged along as well, never having been either, despite having been in the vicinity for quite some time.

Thor became a regular companion on Pepper and Steve's outings after that. He was very curious about their world, about the differences and similarities between it and his own. And he was always eager to become more acquainted with standard human behavior (something his Jane encouraged since she could take him more places if he acted less conspicuous).

He expressed a keen interest in cameras also, having walked in during a conversation between Pepper and Natasha when they were playing with the features of the newest StarkPhone. The two women walked him through a demonstration, and within a day he had filled up the memory on the StarkPhone he used when he was on Earth (no easy feat, considering how much storage the phone had). 

“I wish to share the wonders and eccentricities of this world with my friends on the other side,” He had said, and next time he had come back from Asgard, Pepper had a new camera for him.

It wasn’t anything complicated, a simple point and shoot, but Tony had made a memory card that would hold thousands of pictures at a time. Pepper taught Thor how to use it, and showed him how to take short videos on it as well. The excitement and joy on his face when he would come back from Asgard or another realm with a fresh batch of pictures was a wondrous sight to see. Tony was already making several more memory cards for him, complete with storage cases and a bag to tote it all in. Pepper loved him for it.

Thor was showing off one such batch of photos one evening when all of the Avengers happened to be in residence, and an impromptu dinner and movie night was called for. 

Several of them knew how to cook, but Clint was just back from quite a long absence and volunteered to take point. His specialty was spaghetti, since he had a secret sauce, but he didn’t have all day to do whatever magic it was that went into the sauce, so instead he made loaded chicken. He assigned everyone a job, be it grating cheese (Steve) or slicing mushrooms (Natasha) or fetching Tony from his lab (Bruce, which was a gamble as he was also most likely to get distracted and pulled into whatever science shenanigans Tony was getting up to). 

Pepper was heating oil in a heavy-bottomed skillet while Clint trimmed chicken breasts, and she took the opportunity to chat with him.

“So were you on vacation, or a mission?” Pepper asked him, swirling the oil around the bottom of the pan.

“Started with a mission, ended with some leave, so a bit of both. Sometimes you just need to shake the SHIELD out of your hair and have some R and R.”

Pepper grinned, sprinkling some salt and pepper on the oil. “I totally get that, sometimes I need to shake the Stark Industries out of my hair and have some R and R, but then I come home to another Stark.”

Clint chuckled and transferred a few pieces of chicken to the pan. “Five minutes on that side, then we flip. You ever need us to lose him somewhere, you just say the word.”

Pepper glanced over to where Bruce was herding Tony into the kitchen, even making shooing motions as Tony was trying to make a case for “five more minutes”. 

“Nah, I like him too much. Wash him out of my hair, yes, but never my life. Besides, he gets lost in his lab enough as it is.”

“My Lady Pepper, there is one picture I neglected to show you last time I left this realm, one I believe you would enjoy seeing.”

Pepper turned to Thor with a smile, and her smile broadened as she saw the picture. It was a candid shot of herself and Tony, smiling and laughing together during the last movie night they had all had a month or two ago.

“I’m going to have to get a copy of that. Or maybe a couple, Dum-E would love one for his shrine.”

At the slight look of confusion on Thor’s face, Pepper explained the pictures the robot kept putting up on the fridge in the lab while Clint reassigned her and Thor to chopping green onions and preparing instant mashed potatoes. Thor got to do the potatoes, since he found small human inventions like that very interesting, and turning coarse powder and water into potatoes was amusing to him. Which was amusing to Clint.


	3. A Shopaholic Archer

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pepper discovers the things she has in common with Clint.

Clint had actually been the surprise, out of all of them. Pepper hadn’t even met him until the day she happened upon him in Tony’s lab a couple months after the Chitauri invasion, being barraged with questions about what improvements could be made to his equipment.

“I’m not even sure I’m comfortable with you making me anything, Stark. How do I know it won’t start talking back to me in a poncy accent?” Clint had shot a glance at the ceiling, obviously referring to JARVIS.

"I'm flattered, Agent Barton," JARVIS instantly replied, making Clint look like he was expecting a Skynet situation any minute now.

“So don’t use it if you don’t want it," Tony continued without missing a beat (if his AI was gonna go Skynet, he'd be the first to know), "but I’m gonna make it anyway. Is your bow the right length, or would you benefit from extra inches?”

“A man can always benefit from extra inches.” Clint had joked, the words out of his mouth before he had seen Pepper in the room, and he when he saw her a split second later, he covered his mouth and blushed nearly as red as Steve when he accidentally opened a porn site on the communal floor for the first time.

“I am so sorry, ma’am, I didn’t know you were here.”

Pepper had held back her laughter when she’d seen how embarrassed he was, but one little giggle still snuck out when she saw Tony bending over his work table, head buried in his arms, shoulders shaking with silent mirth.

“It’s okay, I have heard worse. And not just from Tony." She smiled and held out her hand, "I’m Pepper Potts, Tony’s… everything.”

Clint smiled at her words and shook her hand, recovered from his humiliation. “Agent Clint Barton.”

She nodded, smile fading slightly as she quietly said, “I saw you at the funeral.”

Shadows crossed both their faces. The loss of Phil Coulson still very painful on both sides, and probably would be for a long while yet. They were distracted from their shared sadness when Tony got to his feet, cheeks still red from trying to silence his laughter from before.

“Pep, what can I do for you, my everything? I’m just designing awesome new stuff for Merida, here.”

Clint sighed at the obnoxious nickname, and Pepper grinned. Terrible nicknames were Tony’s thing, nobody was immune.

After that, it took seeing Clint around the Tower or at Avengers events a few more times before they developed a camaraderie, but once they settled into it, Pepper enjoyed their friendly relationship very much.

They both liked cooking, and more than once they could be found on a Saturday morning standing side by side at the stove, making omelets with mushrooms and spinach and fancy cheese, or crepes with strawberries and whipped cream, or sometimes whatever the next person to come into the kitchen suggested.

Clint also loved to shop, which was a delightful surprise for Pepper, and when he found out that Steve and Pepper were going out on buddy dates all the time, demanded that he get one too so they could go to the mall. 

Steve had barely survived the encounter, all the people and unfamiliar things and _prices_ overwhelming him quickly so that he ended up ensconcing himself in an art supply shop for a good portion of the trip. Natasha shopped with a critical eye, looking at everything but only buying things she really liked. Clint loved window shopping the most, looking and looking while barely buying anything, and Pepper had been horrified at the end of the day to count up how much money she had spent herself.

The other thing Pepper did with Clint was veg out and watch TV. Sometimes, she just needed to watch something mindless, and if anyone knew mindless TV, it was Clint. Pepper could give him a genre, a mood, even an actor or actress, and Clint could provide a list of shows for her viewing pleasure, often binge-watching them with her while they sprawled on opposite sides of the sectional and shared popcorn and whatever oddly-flavored soda that Clint had stashed away. They spent one weekend marathoning the sci-fi series Firefly, and the follow-up movie Serenity, and they were both bawling by the end, attracting a lot of befuddled attention from their Tower-mates at nearly four in the morning.

“Ohhhh, Firefly. Well, that’s okay then.” Natasha had mumbled around a yawn once she’d realized, in her foggy state of disturbed sleepiness, what they were watching. She climbed over the back of the couch and slid in next to Clint, curling up next to him and resting her head on his shoulder. “Next time, I wanna watch too.”


	4. An Ice Cream Loving Assassin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A science sleepover for Tony turns into a girls night for Pepper and the other ladies.

Natasha was interesting to get to know, but tricky, and therefore took longer, a few years even. Not only because of the previous interaction she and Pepper had, but because of her role as the only woman on the team, and the person who was arguably the most deadly with the exception of the Hulk. Pepper had looked up information on all of the Avengers, trying to get an idea of who they were, but stopping short of invading their privacy. What little of Natasha’s story she could find out was heartbreaking, so Pepper proceeded with the best route she knew of.

Girl time.

It had happened in a bit of a surprising way, actually, and Pepper was grateful in hindsight for how it had panned out.

After Tony had blown up all of his suits and had the arc reactor taken out of his chest, there had been a brief period of bliss, and then the stir-craziness had kicked in. Suddenly deprived of his main source of tinkering, Tony had been about to launch himself into some deeply unwise projects when Pepper had intervened and called for a Science Sleepover.

Tony had been wanting to work with Jane Foster for a long time, he had talked more than once about how brilliant she must be to figure out “crazy Asgardian shit”, so Pepper had pulled some strings and invited the scientist to the Tower to play with Bruce and Tony. (Yes, it had been shockingly similar to what Pepper imagined arranging playdates for toddlers was like.)

One thing had led to another, explosions rocked the Tower more than once, and fires were put out all over the place, then three days into it, Jane had stumbled from Bruce’s lab wide-eyed, singed, and dazed, and muttered, “I need a break.”

Pepper had been passing by, checking up on all of them, and after showing Jane to a guest suite where she could work on getting that cloud of science mania out of her head, extended an invitation for a girls night.

Jane had invited her intern/bestie Darcy Lewis, Pepper invited Natasha, and Natasha had suggested inviting Maria Hill.

Wine, ice cream, nail polish, and a box of tiny, brightly colored elastics accompanied a showing of Legally Blonde in the communal living room. Darcy (who had taken one starry-eyed look at Natasha and immediately blurted out, “You’re my favorite human, I’m gonna be you when I grow up.”) was twisting tiny, intricate braids into Jane’s hair, tying each one off with one of the little elastics. Natasha had made herself a “wine float” with some vanilla bean ice cream and a bottle of burgundy. Pepper was putting a clear coat over the hot rod red polish on her toes, and Maria was snuggling a pint of triple chocolate ice cream like it was going to save her life, her eyes glued to the screen while Elle Woods kicked judicial ass.

Leaning over, Natasha murmured quiet enough that only Pepper could hear, "This was a good idea."

Pepper smiled and clinked her wine glass with Natasha's. "Thanks."

It was at that point that Clint, Thor, and Steve showed up, and Clint screeched in a deeply offended voice, “You’re watching Legally Blonde _without me?!_ ”

Natasha held out her wineglass (now full of sparkling white wine and coffee ice cream), and patted the couch cushion next to her. “We’re watching Miss Congeniality next, then Clueless and Dirty Dancing if we’re still awake.”

With a happy noise and a gulp of the proffered “drink”, Clint stretched out on the couch. “Can I quote lines?”

“Not out loud.”

Steve and Thor glanced at each other, then shrugged, joining the party. Steve only managed to stick it out for about half an hour (so many references he didn’t understand, and the nail polish was overwhelming his enhanced sense of smell) before he excused himself, but Thor had traded places with Jane, perching her on his lap while he situated himself at Darcy’s feet, big shoulders wedged between her knees, and the brunette was happily pulling the demi-god’s hair back into a fishtail braid while she whispered lines of the movie to herself.

Pizza was ordered an hour later, and shortly after that the Science Bros turned up as well, both smelling strongly of gunpowder, smoke, engine grease, and something metallic.

“We’re having a party and nobody told me?” Tony grumbled, sliding down next to Pepper with a piece of pizza in each hand and a pint of ice cream tucked under his arm.

She reached over and scratched her freshly manicured and barely-dried nails through his hair, earning an appreciative groan. “It’s girls night, Clint and Thor crashed. Steve was here too, for a bit.”

Clint was sprawled on the floor, head tipped back to watch the movie upside down while his feet rested in Natasha’s lap, Darcy painting his toes a garish orange while Natasha went over it with a detail brush and did minuscule purple hearts. “Sandra Bullock is a goddess, and she kicks ass.”

Bruce was looking at Thor, sound asleep on the couch and snoring quietly with his arms wrapped around Jane. “What’s with his hair?”

Darcy reached over and adjusted the paper flower crown that was sitting crookedly on the completed fishtail braid in Thor’s hair. “I think he looks pretty. God of Thunder and Good Hair.”

Natasha chuckled and gave her a fistbump.

With a chuckle and a smile, Bruce nicked himself a few slices of pizza and quietly watched the movie as he ate, politely turning down an offer for Darcy to paint his nails or braid his hair, then slipped away, shooting Pepper a smile when he saw her watching. He slid past Steve as the supersoldier was coaxed back to the party by the scent of pepperoni, and the girls night continued quite a bit past the wee hours of the morning.


	5. A Mild-Mannered Scientist with Breathtaking Anger Management Issues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How Pepper and Bruce built their friendship.
> 
> This chapter is for my Bruce Banner Bingo square U3 - free space!

The breakthrough with Bruce, in Pepper’s opinion, happened shortly after he moved into the Tower with her and Tony. She had been in the lab, trying to get Tony to go get ready for an event that evening, and Bruce had been the quiet presence he always was, not saying anything, just smiling faintly in the background.

“You think if I double my donation, I don’t have to go?” Tony suggested only a little bit desperately, his hands moving almost fast enough to blur as he tried to finish up his notes on the holoscreen.

“Not if you’re giving a speech, Tony. Now go get ready or I’m gonna have to resort to some truly awful tactics.”

Meeting Pepper's eyes through the screen, he grinned cheekily. “Gonna try to coax me there with sex?”

She saw Bruce roll his eyes fondly at Tony’s question, and she hid a smile at the reaction. Tony needed that man in his life. A snark always needed another snark to keep them in line.

She knew she sounded positively smug when she answered Tony back. “No, but I’ll hide an iPhone down here and you’ll just have to live with yourself knowing that you have an Apple product in your lab.”

Tony had narrowed his eyes at Pepper and pointed at her. “I refuse to negotiate with terrorists, but you scare me, so I’ll capitulate just this one time.”

Bruce smiled a little bit as Pepper gestured the way out of the room, and Tony went, mumbling to himself and resuming his work on the tablet he snagged off a table on the way. She could see that Bruce was almost back in his zone when the sound of his name brought him out of it again.

“Bruce?”

His head bobbed up and his eyes met Pepper's where she was standing by the door alone, her hand resting on the keypad. She paused, uncertain how to broach the subject, then forced herself to speak.

“I know you’re, well, kind of afraid of me.” She took a breath, preparing herself, but Bruce interrupted her first.

“It’s not that.”

She blinked, not expecting that.

“It’s just that you, uh, you remind me of someone.”

And she knew immediately who he meant, even though there was nothing similar in looks between herself and the woman in Bruce’s past.

Pepper looked at Bruce, and made sure to keep her voice soft. “Betty?”

That surprised him, his brown eyes widening as he stuttered. “How—how do you know…?”

She smiled, just a little bit. “When you’re dating Tony and you’re friends with—” There was a hitch in her breath, something painful lurching in her chest, and she swallowed convulsively, “with Phil… you have access to a lot of things, a lot of information. If you want to know it. And since you, all of the Avengers, but you especially, are such a big part of Tony’s life now, I wanted to know who you all were.”

Bruce nodded, and she expected him to feel uncomfortable about the thought that anyone in the tower knew about Betty, but instead he looked at Pepper calmly. Maybe even like a friend.

She decided to go for it. “If you ever want to talk… about anything. Tea, even, since we both like tea, and we could even drink it while we're talking… I’d be more than happy to talk back. I even took a biochem class once in college, I can google stuff to refresh my memory if you want to go into the shallow end of that pool.”

Bruce’s eyes met hers again across the distance between them, and it had felt like the ice had finally been broken. Instead of looking awkward and maybe a little forced, the small smile on Bruce’s face had seemed genuine. “I’d like that.”

Pepper smiled back, satisfied with the fragile little tendril of friendship between them now. “I also do yoga, so if you wanted me to join you to get Tony to stop mocking you, I could do that too. He’s just mad he’s not flexible enough to do it himself.”

Bruce huffed a quiet laugh, then nodded and with a little wave he went back to his microscope, and Pepper let herself out.

And they did do yoga together, sometimes, and Natasha often joined them too while Tony sat on the sidelines ogling Pepper and lazily stretching. And sometimes they had tea. And sometimes they even talked. Bruce told her, not too long after that first conversation, that knowing someone in the Tower knew about Betty had made the burden seem a little lighter, and Pepper had been glad to share that burden.

Bruce’s sly sense of humor was another thing Pepper valued in the man, especially since he was so unassuming most of the time. His gift from her the previous Christmas had been the perfect cross between something she liked and a gag gift, and it still made her laugh to think about it.

In her office one day in the fall, Tony’s eyes had followed the perpetual movement of the magnetic toy on Pepper’s desk, the blue dolphins on the metal stand swinging back and forth to boop the ball suspended between them. His lip curled in annoyance.

“Can I stop them?”

Pepper hadn’t even looked at him. “Don’t touch my dolphins, Tony.”

With a huff of annoyance, Tony had put on a show of turning his back on the toy, the soft sound of the little foam ball swaying on its chain grating at him.

Bruce watched the exchange with laughing eyes. “It’s a toy operated by science, Tony, how can you not like it?”

“Because it’s irritating.”

Pepper had continued tapping way at her keyboard, sending an email to one of their product shippers. “He hates all of them, something about them drive him crazy.”

Bruce looked like he was on the verge of laughing, which was always nice to see from the calm, even-tempered man. “Which is why you keep them on your desk.”

Pepper shot him a wink, and Tony had turned around so fast he might have wrenched something and gaped at her, scandalized.

Pepper had laughed out loud when she’d opened her present from Bruce the following Christmas and found a Newton’s cradle inside. Bruce had shot her a grin and wink when Tony howled loudly in protest. It now sat proudly on her desk with all the other toys like it, and she used it to great effect whenever Tony was being annoying for no other reason than boredom. Nothing got him out of her office faster than the repetitive click of the silver balls tapping into each other.


	6. And One Dysfunctional Found Family

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The found family that makes up the Avengers is a lot of fun and slightly crazy, even as new members are added. The love stays the same.
> 
> And because I've got some soft Pepperony in the second half of the chapter, this fills my Ladies of Marvel Bingo square M2 - "But darling kiss me slow, your heart is all I own."

The press had a field day every time any of the Avengers were spotted in public, and they went ballistic every time Pepper went on a buddy date with them. According to a few of the worst gossip rags, she was having a torrid affair with everyone on the team, including Natasha.

“Who am I having an affair with today?” She asked one morning as she strode into the communal kitchen, passing time until she and Tony left on a business trip.

Steve enjoyed reading the newspaper still, and he looked up over the edge of the Times. “Nobody today.”

Clint, reading one of the gossip rags they sold at the supermarket, waved the magazine over his head. “Me and Steve. Torrid threesome. There’s a picture of Tony looking heartbroken.”

Grinning, Pepper went around to see the article he was talking about, and laughed at the picture. “That was last week when he dropped his to-go coffee outside SI. He was devastated for a full three minutes.”

“Pepper, you clearly broke the man’s heart, how dare you make light of this situation.”

“Oh no, who is Pepper sleeping with this week?” Tony asked as he came in, looking all sorts of professional and attractive in a sleek suit.

Thor was sprawled on the couch across the room, another of Clint’s gossip rags in his hand. “Nobody, but you and I are having a quarrel over Jane, according to this one.”

“That woman has a beautiful mind, no doubts there.” Tony kissed Pepper on the cheek (and pinched her butt), looking as always like he was at home in her presence. “Feel like I haven’t seen you in ages.”

“Yes, those two hours I spent in the office downstairs must have been a burden on you.”

“Always is, Potts.” Tony turned to the coffee machine and began crooning at it lovingly, devolving into outright stanzas of poetry as it chugged out his espresso.

“I hope he loves you as much as he loves that coffee machine.” Steve idly commented to Pepper as he turned to the next page of the newspaper and blindly groped for his glass of juice.

“Especially when I wear that lingerie he likes.”

Choking a little bit, Steve sprayed a few droplets of juice on the paper, and kicked Clint’s chair when the archer burst out laughing. Tony was waggling his eyebrows at Pepper over the rim of his coffee cup, and Natasha came in looking like she might have been sleepwalking.

“Move or die.” She muttered, and Tony took a sidestep to free up the coffee machine.

“Happy family breakfast at the Avengers Tower.” Pepper murmured to herself, watching with a swell of happiness in her chest as Tony threw an apple at Thor (who caught it), Clint kicked Steve’s chair in retaliation, and Natasha nearly violently wrangled a coffee cup into the right spot on the machine.

Bruce came in, obviously having been awake for a while, and slapped a thin, stapled sheaf of papers on the island counter.

“I win. A blogger online has an ironclad theory about why we’re all sleeping with each other and have orgies after every battle.”

“There’s something I never thought I’d hear the good doctor say.” Tony snarked, ducking the apple core that Thor flung back at him.

“I’ll be sure to get condoms and lube on our way back from Hong Kong. You ready?” Pepper smiled at Tony, appreciating the fact that he picked up Thor’s apple core and threw it away after he deposited his coffee mug in the sink.

“Yup, let’s blow this joint. Have fun, fellow Avengers, don’t start the orgy without me.”

A chorus of goodbyes followed the couple into the elevator, and the smile stayed on Pepper’s face. She was really quite outrageously fond of their weird, dysfunctional family.

* * *

Years passed, their found family grew, but the love between them stayed the same. It was comforting, to have that solid foundation beneath them all to support them during their low times.

“I know I’m forgetting something tomorrow, what is it?” Tony asked as he came out of the en suite bathroom one night, wiping his face with a washcloth.

Pepper had just put on her sleep shirt (stolen from Tony) and was pulling the covers back on their bed, looking forward to sleeping. “Board meeting, 9 am.”

“Ugh, that’s the one. Anything else?”

“Bruce and I will be doing yoga at six if you want to join us, Natasha and Jane might too. Going to lunch with Steve, he found a new place he wants to try and Sam and Bucky may be coming too if they can agree to a brief suspension of their prank war. Gonna try to do a movie night, Thor said he should get back today so he might come for that, and Clint’s gonna show me and Peter and Harley his favorite recipe for caramel popcorn. Apparently there's a secret ingredient. It’s your turn to pick the movie, by the way, did you have something in mind? Oh, and I invited Rhodey too, he’s got some leave and we’re all gonna go to the opera this weekend, I got us tickets.”

Tony was looking at her with a strange expression on his face, somewhere between worry and affection as he arranged his pillows and sat down.

“Pepper, should I be concerned that you are spending more time with the Avengers than I do?”

She leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Nah, don’t worry. You’re still my favorite.”

He smiled to himself, a little smile that was real and sweet and only came out when he really meant it. “If I pick Star Wars again, will they boycott?”

“Probably.”

“What about Rogue One?”

“That’s still Star Wars, and if you make Natasha cry during movie night again, I don’t think you’ll be alive for the next one.”

Tony grumped and got himself comfortable, holding out his arm for her. “Indiana Jones?”

Pepper curled happily into his side and rested her head on his chest. “Long as it’s not the second one.”

“I know, heart part. Grosses you out.”

_And hits too close to home._ “Yep.”

“Third one is my favorite.”

“Bruce will throw a fit that you’re not gonna watch them in order.”

“That’s because he’s obsessive-compulsive, I’m helping him get over it.”

Pepper lifted her head to look at him, her Tony, a smile on her face and in her eyes. “I love you, you know.”

He glanced up at her, then did a double-take when he caught her watching. And his eyes crinkled up in a smile. “I know, honey. Me too.” He leaned up for a kiss, lingered for a minute, then murmured against her lips, “And I do know why you spend time with them. Thanks.”

With a smile, she laid back down and got comfortable, her hand lying protectively over the center of his chest. “You’re welcome. Goodnight.”

“G'night, Pep.”


End file.
